In 1949, the U.S. made Albert II the first monkey in space. In 1961, the Soviet Union made Yuri Gagarin the first human being in space. Earlier this year, two Canadian teens sent the first LEGO man to space. Next week, Electronic Arts will set a new record by sending the first video games to space, and if you're lucky enough to catch one of them on the way down, it's yours. The publisher will attach six copies of "Mass Effect 3" into space some time next week to weather balloons, which will take the games to "the edge of interstellar space" and then send them back to earth.

According to G4, each copy will be launched from a different location: New York, San Francisco, Las Vegas, Berlin, London and Paris. (Suck it, Russia!) Fans will be able to track the games with built-in GPS devices, and when they touch down -- be it in your backyard or the middle of an ocean -- retrieving the items will be a free-for-all. It's obviously just a gimmick, but it's a pretty nifty gimmick if you ask us!

Now that EA/DICE has released BF3 they may figure someone there can work the bug out. EA decided to release an unfinished POS they call "Origin". They needed a way to compet with "Steam". "Steam" has had its issues but at the end of the day, it works. "Origin", although being released last summer is still BETA. It doesn't look like it will ever be completed.
The "Battlefield Series" has been very successful and those of us that play have waited for years for "Battlefield 3" to be released. EA/Dice had put a great amount of time into it and promised to hold release until it was bug free. However, "COD Modern Warfare" anounced their release date and the race was on.
EA/Dice pulled out all the stops. This meant release BF3 bugs and all. And not just do PC players, XBOX and PS3 players got bad copies too. EA/Dice covered their ass' with a well written EULA. Kind of a "You bought it, good luck" warranty.
Although thousands of would be players have issues, EA/Dice just looks the other way. Some buyers have yet to play the game. Others have reinstalled "Windows" and re downloaded 16gig of game data, only to be no better off than when they started.
Me, I'm one of the lucky ones. Most days it works with few errors. I have many friends that are not so lucky.
I'm pretty sure I'll never buy another EA game. I know I'll never buy a game that uses "Origin".
(End rant here)

Exaactly, thats not a rant thats reason, what is wrong with this picture, their practices and games get inexcusably worse, but look they have money for this stupidity that does nothing for the product, the advertising is one thing, but this? They make Origin into some that isn't garbage bloat or fix their games, but no, they are resorting to publicity stunts.. for what?!

Sounds like a good way to get attention for your company. Think, yeah their throwing a handful of games up in the air at a cost to them. But this article on sodahead just proves right here proves they'll get a good amount of attention for it.

bad attention if you've ever been a customer for EA, had to deal with nonesense, games that seemed to need more time, they could have spent this money to let devs deliver a better, completed product, but no, they rather do publicity stunts.

And what is the point? Are people going to fight it out over a copy just because it went into space? I'm guessing there is absolutely nothing special about it besides that, and if that destroys the game then it will be pointless.

Just reading the headline I thought it a great idea. I thought they were going to send them up with astronauts for long stays in space. The entertainment might keep them from thinking just like TV does with most of us. If they have too much time to think, they might start to realize that, in working for the government, they are working for gangsters who are fleecing the people and become opponents of the space program. But, since that isn't the case, it's asinine.

If they were just floating it into space then it would be pretty stupid... however, the whole retrieving thing is actually a pretty good idea. The chances of one landing in suburban/metropolitian Iowa? Probably not, haha.

Oh sure, lets piss off another race of aliens by showing them how we glorify the mass murder of their people for our entertainment. And then we wonder why every single alien movie is about them wiping us out

I do not believe that would matter. We have weapons capable of nuclear fusion. It would destory any spaceship out there pretty much. I do not believe World Unity needs to be achieved in order for the space age to begin, maybe the aliens are like that and see us as a threat, maybe not.

In my opinion, if alien beings existed, they would probably have superior defense systems and they realize that people who have never seen an alien race would naturally fear them. They don't approach Earth not because they know the governments would use launch nuclear missiles, as they could easily destroy them and our planet if they wanted to, but they don't come near our planet as they don't want to cause any interference with our planet as the society hasn't reached maturity yet. They also probably understand that due to our society's fear of more powerful beings, the media produced would naturally portay them as enemies. If aliens existed, they would realize that there are plenty of other cultures in a pre-space era that fear aliens as well.